Preliminary report
Writing a quick preliminary report on some of the main conditions; I'll amend it Tuesday with photos.
trail conditions
All of the blowdowns near James Camp and between James and the West Fork White River crossing area cleared, and there has been quite a bit of recent trail work done there. Big thanks to all the trail crews: that looked like a lot of trees to clear and trail damage to reinforce!
There is some recent rockfall along the Carbon Glacier south of the suspension bridge, but the washouts below Dick Creek camp have been properly routed around and are easy to follow.
Beyond that, the trail was in great shape; I think we had to climb over only two or three logs in the entire 36-odd miles we covered.
river crossings
The Winthrop Creek bridge is in good condition; when we crossed it at about 4pm on Saturday the west end was a bit damp from spray.
The West Fork White River crossing near Mystic Lake at about 5pm on Sunday was a slightly challenging rock hop: I recommend crossing it earlier in the day so the water level isn't as high.
The West Fork White River crossing between James and Fire Creek was fine Monday at 10am, but we'd heard that late afternoon on the weekend the water was getting close to the base of one of the bridges. Note that there are two distinct crossings: one involving a rock hop and large logs slightly west of the main river, and the two new log bridges with railings north of where most GPS maps show the trail crossing the river. You'll have to go follow a beat-down track downstream a bit to find the those bridges, but they're in good shape. You can see the previous bridge hung up on the rocks on the east side, where the trail reaches the river.
bears
We saw bears each day: a mama and cub by Shadow Lake on day one; a mama and two cubs at the unnamed (to my knowledge) lake on the south side of Windy Gap; and a mama and 1-3 cubs (we didn't know if we were seeing the same cub repeatedly, or multiple cubs) at the creek just north of Berkeley Camp. In all cases they all eventually trundled off after we chatted at them. We'd heard reports of up to six bears between Yellowstone and Windy Gap.
Berries
Lots of blueberries between Mystic and James, though many of them are a bit beyond peak ripeness and taste a little off. Especially just above Mystic they were quite good.
Bugs
No bothersome bugs, except for a massive swarm at the top of Skyscraper. We took a side trip up there for the view, but immediately were swarmed with flies and beat a hasty retreat without any photos. There was hardly any wind, which is probably why there were so many flies.
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